by Ella James
It’s some magic, like she’s pulling something out of me. My face flushes. My throat feels too full. Something throbs behind my eyes, and that’s when tears start dripping down my temples.
“I’m here because I wanted to see you. And I don’t think I’m being so good.”
I sit up abruptly, jostling her off me. She touches my hand. I pull it away.
“What are you doing, Elise? Go home.”
My words hurt her. I can feel it in her posture, hear it in the way she breathes. I can’t see her face because I’m holding my head now.
“Why?” she whispers.
“Do you want to hurt yourself?”
“I’m not doing that.” Her words are so soft. “I’m healing you, and I can feel how much you need it. Don’t lie to me now. Don’t be a coward, Luca.”
“You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“With you?” She laughs. “I know exactly what I’m doing. Do you think I’m scared? I am, but it’s worth it. Even if we’re twisted up, like you said.”
I look at her. “Why?” I close a hand around her shoulder, shake it lightly. “Why is it worth it? What do you get, rosa?”
She laughs like she thinks I’m crazy. “I get you.”
“For a night?”
“Even for an hour, Luca.”
I swallow, and she takes my face in her hands. “I make my choices. And I want this. For an hour or a night, I want to be here with you.”
“You don’t.” I shut my eyes so I don’t have to see her as I say, “You wouldn’t, if you knew what I am.”
“What are you, some kind of monster?”
“I’ve killed people.”
“Yes, I know already.”
“Does that get you off?” I open my eyes again to find her face taut.
“Don’t be this way. You’re just scared. You’re crying.” She wipes my cheek, and it’s just too fucking much. I get off the bed, feeling like my guts are hanging partway out.
“Who’d you kill, Luca? Why don’t you tell me all the stories, help me see you how you really are, if you’re some kind of crazy killer.”
I throw open the bedroom door. “Do you hear this conversation? It’s time for you to go.”
“No, I want to know. Tell me how many, tell me who they were. Tell me your made-up reasons for pushing me away. So when I remember this with you, this time I’ll understand.”
My heart beats harder.
Now her eyes are shining like she’s trying not to cry. “Did you know I still remember every word you said to Becca? Every word. You told me you loved me this morning. Was that just bullshit?”
I turn toward the door, my chest aching like it might split open. I hold my head, breathing slowly so I can get through this. “They were…a salesman, and a video game fanatic. Young guy. He wanted to do game designing. Then a guy who was going to harm…someone I had to protect.” That one was her father. The Bellinis—the ones who run New Jersey—had a young guy that got pissed off, heard E’s dad was inside at the D.A., leading some kind of investigation against them. He wasn’t. But this young dude panicked, tried to hunt him down. When he got too close, I did what was needed. Noah Bellini was grateful I took care of the guy.
“After that, two guys tried to sink me with some cargo. You know what they say…sleeping with the fishes.” Somebody was gonna die that night. It was me or them. Got the two of them with one bullet. Unintentional—but one was standing right in front of the other. “One of those guys was young, though. I felt bad about that.” I tug at my hair, taking another deep breath.
“The next two also were in a pair. You kill one, you’ve gotta get the other. Can’t have any witnesses. You know how that is.” I don’t hear a fucking thing. I tell myself that’s good, even as my heartbeat quickens. Not like this was going to work out. “Next—”
“What did they do?” Her voice rings like a bell in the quiet. “What were they doing when you killed them? The two you just said, who were somewhere together.”
“They were kicking someone’s ass.” My brother’s. Really hurt him. He was in the hospital for nine days—his only crime behaving differently than other kids at community college.
“The next three were fucking liars. We were” —I clamp my molars on the inside of my cheek— “making an exchange.” That was some H—the first time I was in the role Alesso fills now: overseeing. I remember it was cold that morning down at the warehouses. Dark night. Right near Valentine’s Day. They were thinking they could fuck me over. Figured I was just some new guy, didn’t know which way was up. “Anyway, that was the last of them. I didn’t want to do it that time, but I also wasn’t gonna die.”
I turn toward her. It’s the best time, because I feel numb now. “Should I keep going?” I ask. She looks perfectly impassive.
“Of course.” Her voice is reedy, but she squares her shoulders. “I don’t ask questions I don’t want people to answer.”
I shrug, trying to focus on something that’s not her face. Like the bed’s headboard. There’s a nick in the wood, this one little pale spot.
“Shitheads always move in packs. The next two were in a car. They robbed someone…I cared for deeply. Beat him till he fucking died.” I try to swallow, but it’s hard to think of this shit, even now. That was Luigi. I tracked those fuckers down and used a knife. It was my first and last close-range encounter. Still have dreams about how warm the blood was. “I can never regret that.”
I look at her again, sitting cross-legged at the foot of the bed. She’s wrapped a blanket around herself, so I can’t see her body.
“Another dude broke into my house—while I was in there. Looking for drugs. Startled me awake, which was a bad move. All the other ones were pimps and smugglers, liars, people fucking over other people. People who hurt people I knew. In almost every case, I didn’t have to kill them. But some people are like spiders. You don’t kill them, you just take them to the yard instead, and they keep coming back in. Every time you open the door, fuckers will just walk in, right over the threshold like they own the place.”
“How do you know that?” she asks quietly. “About spiders?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“Do you…capture them, and take them outside? In bowls or cups? You know if you put a bowl or cup over them, then you slip a few pieces of paper under it and put your hand on top…”
“That’s not a good idea.” I lift a brow. “Some spiders bite.”
“Do you do it, though? Do you take them outside…if you catch them?”
I blow a breath out, run a hand back into my hair. “So what if I don’t like to kill a spider? It’s pragmatic. Frogs and lizards eat them.”
“So you do it for the frogs?” Her face is calm now. I’ve got no clue what’s in her head.
“If I did it, I would do it because I don’t want to see their guts squished on my wall. Because I don’t like the guts. And I don’t like to see their broken spider legs or wonder if the other spiders miss them. That doesn’t mean shit. What would you tell little Elise? Stick with this one?” I laugh—this weird, strangled, faux chuckle.
“Well we’ll never know that, will we? You stole that choice.”
“Yes, that’s right. I didn’t give you one.”
“Why not?” she whispers.
“I was farther down than you were in the tunnel. I could see the light at the end, and I knew it was a fucking train. And you know what? I don’t regret it.” I’m pacing around because I can’t stay still for this shit, can’t look at her face as I tell her the truth. “You know why I really came to your party? To your D.A. victory party? I came because I wanted to see the payoff—for what I did. I wanted to see it, hear it, get a good look at it. I got caught and taken under, on the tracks, but you got out. That’s how it was always gonna to be. You were from the family. My dad was a fucking narc. Management’s kids don’t get fucked. You were going to Columbia. I wasn’t about to wreck that! The second that I thought about it—really thought—I
knew I never could.”
“How would you have wrecked it?” I can’t read her face as she grips the sheet she’s got pulled over her chest.
“You ever heard what happened to your granddad’s wife?”
Her eyes go so wide, I feel a kick of regret mentioning it. But I decide to press where it hurts. Touching her again here in this cabin would be a mistake I don’t know how I’d come back from. All that about “better to have loved and lost”—those bastards don’t know shit.
“Yeah, you thought about that yet?” I ask. “Lamberto is your blood, cara. You know what happened to his wife? The one he claimed in public?”
Her brows notch just slightly. I step over to the bed, standing before her, still unclothed from what we just did. “Your dad’s mother was the mistress. Lamberto’s wife, she got gunned down. It was a retribution killing. She was at a beauty parlor.”
I can’t be sure, but I think her cheeks lose some of their color.
“The way I did it was the right way. I didn’t get to follow my dreams, but you got to be D.A. Now I get to see you in my dreams and in my nightmares.” I’m going for funny. Just some sort of fucked-up humor moment, something true but softer. But I don’t make my mark. A single tear drips down her cheek.
20
Elise
If I live to be one hundred, I will never forget those words, in his quiet voice. “Now I get to see you in my dreams and in my nightmares.” I’ll be seeing the way his cheek tucked up in the world’s saddest smile. For me. Nor will I forget his blue eyes when he said that crazy stuff about the train. How he looked…proud that he’d shattered my heart.
All the…killings. That spiked my pulse at first, but God, he really is the same. No one who takes spiders outside “to feed frogs” is murdering unnecessary people.
I laugh as a tear drips down my cheek. Unnecessary people. I am losing my mind.
I watch him walk back over to his weekend bag, pull out another pair of boxer-briefs.
“You know what I think about spiders? And really all indoor bugs?” I ask, looking at him in the mirror as he runs a hand back through his hair again. “I feel like—okay, I know this is crazy. Sort of crazy. But I can’t help wondering if like…everything is this system, right? I mean, we know it is. Just look at the bacteria in a human body. We are carrying these tiny, microscopic things around within us—in our stomachs, on our skin. And then the system widens to the population level, and species level, and the ecosystem level. Then you get to the planet level, the galaxy level. Like, we’re the planet’s skin bacteria, and we don’t even know it. Anyway. If it’s all connected—if maybe we’re all just one big system—then it bothers me to kill the spiders. I was killing them through college and law school. But then—” I shake my head. “Now I take them outside. When I get them. Which in my place now, I never do, because they spray stuff.”
My eyes grab his as he turns back to me, and his lips twitch in this smirky little smile. It used to be the smile that told me he thought I was cute or funny. Charming. It’s the smile that says I like you. Just because.
“So you’re not killing any spiders,” he says, gripping the dresser’s ledge and leaning back against it.
“No,” I whisper.
He steps closer. There’s a notch between his brows as he crouches by the bed’s low mattress, reaching toward my face without touching it.
“I think you got a dimple, rosa.”
I can feel my cheeks warm as I cover the left one with my hand. “No I didn’t.” I did.
“Yeah, I think you did. I’m pretty sure. Let me see.”
“Dimples were your thing.”
He grins, showing it off. “Man indention.”
There’s a moment here; I’ve noticed there almost always is. Luca grins with his dimple. I’m smiling at him, feeling the smile down to my soul. And I have this moment where it’s all a clear path. As I look into his blue eyes, drinking in his Luca-ness—right here beside me, so close I feel dizzy—I feel something shift deep in my soul, where coal is shoved into the heart fire to keep the other engines running. I’m surprised and also not surprised that it feels like no decision at all.
He’s here, and he’s the same. He didn’t come back different from the war. He’s still the boy I loved. I think distantly that I have spiders to thank for this. Then I reach out, brushing his cheek with my shaking fingers.
He leans closer—our foreheads are almost touching—and his eyes glisten. His hand cradles my chin, strong fingers splayed along my jaw. “You’re still an angel,” he says. “Still too nice. Too…selfless.”
“No I’m not.”
“I’m being selfish,” he says softly. “Playing games.”
“So what’s the game?”
His eyes are tired.
I take his hand and press it to my chest. I close my eyes, and his lips brush mine. Then we deepen the kiss, and I’m lost in it, to it. I’m nothing but sensation—the dizzy sensation of melting against a man’s hard body. He’s crawling on the bed beside me, then we’re lying down and he’s atop me. He’s so heavy. He’s so warm. He’s scooping me up so he can flip us.
He’s on his back, and I’m straddling his hips. I’m laughing into his mouth because this is what he used to do. He’s arching up to meet me, his tongue hot, insistent, even as his hand cups my head gently. Oh hell, now it’s not gently. He’s gripping my hair so it hurts.
I wrench my mouth from his, looking down between our bodies as I rub myself against him. I feel him hard against me, rocking his hips, groaning as if he’s never been touched—not since me. He’s perfect, and I’m rubbing up and down his body, tracing the rim of his preposterously long and thick cock. His whole body trembles, and he tilts his head back, starts to moan.
Little whispered nothings, and I worry that I won’t remember. “Amo questo. Amo le tue mani su di me.” He loves my hands. I tell him I love his body. Then I’m crouching down between his legs. I’m licking him. He’s going crazy, bucking under me before I even seal my mouth around him. Then I do, and he’s clutching my hair, his palm cupped around the back of my head.
He groans, “Oh fuck, rosa.” His hips tremble like the ground during an earthquake, and it happens so fast. His hand shoves my forehead as his grande pene gives a hard throb, and he lifts his hips off the bed, trying valiantly to get away from me—but I’m still sucking. I’m swallowing.
He makes a sound—almost a mewling sound, but lower. Then he’s panting, his whole body shaking so much that at first I’m almost worried.
“Sorry,” he rasps. His hand covers his face.
I grip his hips, giving them a shake as I laugh, “Why are you sorry, Galante? You just got a killer blow job.”
He moves his hand off his eyes. I watch as his mouth twists, torn between surprised, elated, guilty.
“Do you think it’s okay?” I ask, husky.
His eyes close as he shifts his hand down to his heart, if he’s saying the pledge. “Yeah. I know it’s okay. I would never let you…if I thought we needed condoms.” He sounds winded—so much that it makes me wonder if he’s sick or something.
I give his dick a little pat and move so I’m stretched out beside him. Then I wrap an arm around him. He wraps his arms around me—we’re facing each other—and he starts breathing harder. Like he’s struggling to get enough air.
“Hey…” I rub his neck, noticing it feels warm. I can feel the little prickles of his hair along his neckline, and it gives me a strange burst of pleasure.
“Are you okay?” I whisper, kissing his temple.
He tightens his grip on me, nodding into my hair.
I press him against me, rubbing his back, which feels slightly damp. “Are you cold?” I reach toward the covers, but he tightens his grip on me.
“Not cold,” he says, and it sounds like he’s speaking through clenched teeth. But his body gives this little shudder, like a counterpoint.
“Hi, Not Cold. I’m Elise, and I really want to cover you up.” I ki
ck the covers up from where they’re pooled at our feet, then reach for them—even as he starts to wrap himself around me. He kisses my neck, panting against my skin. I kiss his forehead. There’s a hoarse sound from him.
“Hey…” I smooth his hair back, finding his eyes closed and his face twisted in what looks like regret. His chest is still pumping. “Luca…is there someone else?” I stiffen in his arms, already wanting to move away, but he squeezes me closer. “No.”
His chest trembles…then his body gives a hard jerk. He’s disentangled from me, clearing the footboard before I can blink.
Luca
Her arms find me from behind as I stand with my head down, gripping the back of the couch.
“Come back to bed,” she murmurs. “Talk to me, and let’s drink cider and have lemon cake and hold each other.”
“I can’t.”
Her palm rubs my back. Then she presses her cheek to my shoulder blade and stands there playing big spoon with her hands clasped under my pecs. “Then we’ll just stand here. Maybe forever.” She kisses my back then rubs her cheek against me.
“I want to know so many things,” she whispers. “Feels like we’ve missed forever.”
I can feel her chest expand on a big breath she blows out quietly.
“Tell me…what’s your favorite thing that you do regularly?”
The answer comes to mind immediately, but I’d never tell her. It’s too strange, too sad. I think it would make her sad to know. My second choice is also something I can’t tell her. It wouldn’t make sense to talk about my pink ops—not without official clearance and endorsement. I close my eyes.
“Ice hockey,” I rasp, and swallow hard to clear the roughness. “We do this rec league in Brooklyn.”
“Is that how you learned to skate?”
I nod. “My friend Alesso talked me into it. And Leo.”
“I remember those names.”
“From work?” I close my eyes, tugging more air into my lungs.